As in this marathon nobody wanted to run at the same pace as Jake, he did as in the first marathons he ran and in the first km, he found small groups that were running at a pace similar to him and ran with them for a few hundred meters.
In the first 5 km, he always found small groups of athletes to run with them, but after that, they didn't have many groups anymore because few ran at a pace equal to or greater than Jake in this marathon.
Those athletes that Jake ran with at the start of the marathon would probably be athletes who would not even finish the marathon or who would arrive after 3 hours of the marathon, Jake didn't really need to run with other athletes to be able to finish the marathon.
But he learned from Coach Davis to save his stamina as much as possible to ensure he could win the marathon with ease, but how difficult it was to find a group that ran as fast as he did Jake decided to run alone.
